Bio: Jelercic - Yurkovich (Century Farm - 2011)

Contact:stan@wiclarkcountyhistory.org 

Surnames: Yurkovich, Jelercic

----Source: Marshfield News Herald (Marshfield, WI) 10/12/2011

Jelercic - Yurkovich (Century Farm - 2011)

Century Farm -- Judith Ann & Luke Michael Yurkovich -- Jelercic-Yurkovich Century Farm -- In 1905, Vincent and Mary Jelercic were married in Lorrain, Ohio, after moving by boat to the United States from Vipava, Yugoslavia. While Vincent was working at a steel mill, he came across an ad in the paper for 60 acres for sale in Willard. That 60 acres soon became their home where they built a small house and milked eight cows.

They had two daughters (Mary and Sylvia) beginning in 1914 and in 1919. Mary died of the flu, and Vincent raised his two daughters on his own. In 1921, the present field stone farm house was built. In 1945, Vincent decided to hand over the farm to his daughters.

Sylvia married Valentine Yurkovich in 1946 and together took on the farm. They had six children: Richard, Mary Jo, Edward, Bonnie, Kitty and Luke. The kids all helped on the farm. Valentine and Sylvia milked 30 cows, owned 354 acres and farmed for 54 years, and Sylvia milked the cows and fed the calves until she was 88 years old.

Luke took over the farm along with the help of his sister Bonnie and his parents. Luke purchased more land and paid for the breeding costs to produce cows that soon would replace Sylvia and Valentine's cows. A pipeline was put into place in 1979 to replace the milk cans and buckets they had been milking with. Bonnie was in partnership with the farm until she passed away of cancer in 2010.

In May 1983, Luke met his wife, Judy, and they married three years later and continued to expand the farm from milking 45 cows. More silos were built, more land purchased, tractors bought and cows increased. A heifer barn was built in 1999 and a manure pit installed in 2007. Today, Luke and Judy milk 76 cows, and Luke farms 500 acres of which 300 have crops.